Symantec September 2010 Announcement Highlights
- Enterprise Vault 9.0 addresses new content sources
- NetBackup 5000 is a ‘dedupe’ appliance
- Filestore N8000 is a NAS storage system solution
- Appliances come from its joint venture with Huawei
- Appliances and Cloud Computing both provide IT simplification – the first mainly as Cap Ex and latter as Op Ex
- Appliances enhance the portfolio of offerings for partners
Cloud Computing And Appliances Address IT Simplification For Users
We’ve been thinking about appliances at ITCandor since our meeting with Dell’s Kace – a small division helping SMBs use them to do systems management. It may sound odd but we see a connection between computer appliances and Cloud Computing. Although the approaches are poles apart in terms of the way the solutions are set up and purchased, they are similar in helping to simplify IT for less technical users. Psychologically appliances appeal to the materialists among us and, more importantly, are good for those organisations whose procurement processes favour asset management over buying services – or Cap Ex rather than Op Ex, to give the choice a modern spin. In fact it’s feasibly possible for the same solution to be provided via the Cloud or appliance, although the latter tends to limit capacity in some way – typically to be overcome by upgrading to a bigger box.
IBM has also moved strongly towards an appliance approach at the top end with its ‘workload optimised solutions’ and will no doubt offer many more now that the STG division has been integrated into its Software group under Steve Mills. HDS is also introducing Cloud services run to storage hardware systems exclusively located in user data centres. In short there are all manner of different techniques being developed to simplify and accelerate applications, of which Cloud Computing and appliances are part.
In this article we thought it would be interesting to try to answer a number of questions such as ‘what makes a software company like Symantec enter the hardware market?’ and ‘what are its chances of success?’
Enterprise Vault 9.0 Is Symantec’s Headline Announcement
Symantec’s headline announcement was the introduction of its Enterprise Vault (EV) version 9.0. In particular:
- It has been extended to work with new content sources such as Microsoft Exchange 2010 SP1 and Sharepoint 2010, Entourage 2008, Apple Mac OS 10.6 and IBM Lotus Domino 8.5.1 Mail-In databases and Shortcut Expiry
- Dell’s DX Object Store is now supported with Symantec’s EV Streamer
- Cloud Computing has also been strongly embraced – Verizon’s new Nirvanix Cloud Storage can now be addressed through the OST’s (Symantec initiated) Cloud Connect Application Programming Interface (API), support for Microsoft’s BPOS should help customers migrate to Cloud Computing
- ‘Unified discovery’ now encompasses both Cloud and On-Premise data and information management has been extended across more content sources and deployment models.
The fact that most of the new features of EV 9.0 are extensions to work with other companies’ products underlines its massive success and a practical approach to helping improve customer experiences.
Symantec Is Introducing Two Appliances – NetBackup 5000 and Filestore N8000
The new appliances are interesting as they are early forays into the hardware market. In particular:
- Its NetBackup 5000 is a ‘Dedupe Appliance’ working only with 6.5 or 7 versions of NetBackup (which account for 90% of customers according to Symantec); it can be expanded (‘scaled up’) through the addition of other appliances and raw hardware; initial systems have 16TB of storage per node, of which up to 6 can be deployed; it is built around Symantec’s PureDisk (PD) deduplication technology and can be connected either to a classic PD client configuration or as a ‘dedupe pool’ to a NetBackup media server; ITCandor believes that the initial family will be enhanced and joined by 2 higher-end lines in coming quarters
- Its Filestore N8000 is a storage system made from NAS hardware and Symantec’s Filestore software; it offers n-way clustering with either active-active or active-passive configurations; there are two initial lines, with the rack-mounted N8300 offering up to 6 nodes (a 1PD maximum capacity) and the blade-based N8500 up to 16 nodes and 2PB maximum; software included includes dynamic storage tiering, Antivirus, Filestore and NetBackup; it is claimed to be good for applications such as HPC and Healthcare PACs file systems
Symantec’s appliances are based on hardware built through its joint venture with China’s Huawei set up in 2007. We understand that it is using Hitachi, Seagate and Western Digital hard disks in these devices.
In fact it’s debatable whether or not we should consider these products to be pure appliances, not least because the addition of ‘raw hardware’ indicates upgradeability. Debating the mix of components in an appliance is a job for designers – not research analysts in our opinion. Our definition of an appliance is that it’s a solution based on a non-negotiable vendor-selected set of hardware, software and service. Upgrading involves adding multiple appliances together or replacing the current product with a different sized box.
Why Does Symantec Want To Sell Hardware?
Of course Symantec is interested in expanding its sales. Symantec’s latest announcements come from its Information Management Group (IMG), which doesn’t split out its revenues, so we’ve shown a comparison of all software revenues from major suppliers worldwide in Figure 1. It shows that the recession was bad for all vendors and that both IBM and Symantec have dropped below the 10% growth for all vendors in Q2 2010. It’s possible that Symantec’s customers spent less money in the expectation of these latest releases.
Symantec’s Colin Davitian made some interesting observations about the development of its Filestore appliances in our recent discussions, pointing out that innovation cycles have slowed down and prices lower than they were 10 years ago, when new technologies were being launched regularly and users wanted best-of-breed solutions. These types of system help lower both Cap Ex and Op Ex. He believes that NetApp’s success with similar NAS systems is due to their ease of deployment (they just plug in and work); in any case he doesn’t believe Filestore as software could compete against these heavily integrated systems.
How Appliances Fit With Symantec’s Changing Channel Programme
Symantec is in the process of making a number of changes to its partner Program (SPP): for instance it outsourced its consulting business in April this year. More recently it extended its ExSP licensing model to partners serving the SMB market. Instead of purchasing licenses upfront, the channel can now pay for them on a monthly pay-as-you-go basis, which in turn will make it easier for them to provide managed services to their customers. We expect more changes in the coming months, with Symantec rewarding partners who can grow revenues, volumes, specialisation and develop new capabilities. In short it’s doing its best to make its offerings more appropriate for the changes in ‘value add’ of its channel. Appliances will increase the number of solutions available to resell and the importance of the Symantec brand. They will also be deployed in the data centres of a number of partners who choose to become service providers.
Some Conclusions – Software Companies May Find Hardware Easier Than Cloud For Integrated Software Delivery
As most software companies Symantec’s success has hitherto been built on its role within a horizontal market. However its business planning assumptions are changing as the IT industry model develops. Nowadays customer purchasing decisions are shifting away from ‘what to buy’ towards issues of deployment, procurement type and simplification. This makes packaging more important than ever. Symantec’s far-sighted decision to work with Huawei in 2007 has allowed it to introduce these new appliances. It will also need to make sure its software is incorporated into other vendors’ ‘solutions’ (such as Dell’s DX object Store included in this announcement). In adding hardware to its portfolio Symantec’s relationships with its resellers and hardware suppliers will change, but that’s happening anyway given the growth of managed services, Cloud Computing and the rapid movement all kinds of vendors are making to become more vertically integrated.
As mentioned above IT appliances and Cloud Computing both offer to simplify the deployment and management of IT solutions for IT users – the first as a ‘Cap Ex’ and the latter an ‘Op Ex’ approach. For many software companies encapsulating perpetual licences and support service in an appliance may actually be considerably easier than making sure that usage based pricing doesn’t undermine existing revenue streams in Cloud offerings. Of course Symantec is doing both. It will be interesting to see which approach makes it most money in coming quarters and years.
Are you a Symantec user? Do you see benefits in deploying its new appliances? As always let me know by commenting on this post.